corsus gives presentation at ‘Sustainability Assessment of the Food Chain’ seminar

On 22 September, the European Federation of Food Science and Technology (EFFoST) organised the online seminar ‘Sustainability Assessment of the Food Chain‘. The seminar attracted well over a hundred interested participants. The introductory lecture was given by Dr Ulrike Eberle of corsus.

The seminar is part of the EFFoST seminar series ‘Sustainable Food Systems: Connecting Expertise in Academia and Industry’, which aims to provide detailed insights into different facets of sustainability in the food sector.

Ulrike Eberle spoke about social issues in the sustainability assessment of food. She highlighted the importance of the role of food and food businesses in achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals and the urgent need for action. Ban Ki Moon, former Secretary General of the United Nations, urged business to act in 2015, when the Sustainable Development Goals were adopted: “Business is a vital partner in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Companies can contribute through their core activities, and we ask companies everywhere to assess their impact, set ambitious goals and communicate transparently about the results.”

In order for companies to know where they stand, tools to assess the sustainability of food are urgently needed so that they can use the results to target value chains for greater sustainability. Ulrike Eberle presented the ‘Sustainability Assessment of Products (SEP)‘ method developed by the Centre for Sustainable Leadership (ZNU), which can be used to specifically measure the contribution of products to the achievement of goals. She emphasised how important it is, especially against the backdrop of the German Supply Chain Due Dilligence Act, to explicitly deal with the social impacts of production along the entire value chain. In this context, she also presented the tool ‘ProFitS‘, which is accessible free of charge and enables a straightforward implementation of the assessment.